Pan Roasted Cauliflower with Roasted Red Pepper Sauce

serves 2

Cauliflower:
1/2 head of cauliflower broken up into medium sized florets
3 cloves of garlic, peeled and slightly smooshed
4 T (1/4 cup) extra virgin olive oil
sea salt to taste

You want to use a not nonstick pan for this in order to achieve the proper level of roastiness. :)

Heat the oil and garlic in a cast iron skillet over medium heat. Once the oil gets good and hot and the garlic starts sizzling, add the cauliflower in a single layer. Let it go without stirring for longer than you think you should. Peek under a floret and if it is nicely browned use a spatula to flip the florets and get a different side roasty. Once again, let it go until the other side is nice and brown. At this point, turn the heat to low, salt the cauliflower to your taste, cover the pan, and let it steam itself for 10 minutes. Voila! Perfectly tender, roasty cauliflower with the bonus of a few little roasty garlic cloves. Mmm.

This cauliflower goes perfectly with roasted red pepper sauce.

Roasted Red Pepper Sauce:
1 red bell pepper
1 T white wine vinegar
1 peeled and slightly smooshed garlic clove
1.5 T extra virgin olive oil

Preheat an oven or toaster oven to 400 degrees and line a cookie sheet with foil. Bake the bell pepper until the skin starts to blacken, about 30-40 minutes. Pull the pepper out of the oven and use the foil to wrap it up into a packet. Let it sit steaming in it own residual heat for 10-15 minutes. Unwrap the pepper. The skin should be very loose and quite easy to peel off. Peel the pepper and discard all the skin and seeds.

Heat the vinegar and garlic clove in a small pan until it gets fragrant. Discard the garlic clove.

Puree the bell pepper, garlic infused vinegar, and olive oil in a food processor. You can add a little pinch of salt and some red pepper flakes or cayenne powder if you want a bit of a kick.

Keeps well for a few days in the fridge and makes enough sauce to use several times for different veggies.